Chapter XXIX: The Plot

The girl screamed and tried to run, but Higby was too quick for her and seized her roughly by the arm.

"No, you don't!" he cried. "You're not going to get away from me as easily as all that, after I've been watching you for days. You've got to listen to what I have to say."

"Let me go!" cried the girl, pulling away from him.

"Go where?" he leered. "To jail? You'll go there mighty quick if I care to have you go. All I have to do is to notify the police at Roxbury and you'll be behind the bars in forty-eight hours."

The girl turned white as the awful vision that had haunted her for a year past seemed to be assuming form and substance. She had no doubt that he could do as he threatened.

"What do you want with me?" she asked in a trembling voice.

"Now you're getting a little more sensible," he remarked. "Sit down on that bank and I'll tell you what I want.

"Those folks you're staying with are pretty well off, aren't they?" he inquired.

"How do you know where I'm staying?" she asked.

"That's my affair," he said brusquely. "I know you're staying at a place they call Camp Kill Kare. Quite a change from the gypsy camp," he sneered. "You're flying high these days. But that's neither here nor there. Those boys and girls there seem to have plenty of money. There'd be quite a haul there in the way of cash and watches and diamond rings and other jewelry, I suppose."

She grasped his meaning and drew away from him in horror.

"You don't mean to say that you're thinking of robbing the house!" she exclaimed.

"You're pretty squeamish for a jailbird," he sneered.

"I'm not a jailbird!" she cried passionately. "I never did a dishonest thing in my life!"

"They say differently at Roxbury," he taunted.

"Yes!" she blazed out. "But why? Because you told a falsehood about me! You know you didn't see me steal that purse!"

"Let's cut this short," he said impatiently. "I'll put the whole thing in a few words. I'm not going back to Roxbury. I need money, and need it bad! Those folks at Kill Kare have plenty of it, or what can be turned into money, and I want you to help me get it."

"I never will!" she cried defiantly.

"It's either that or jail," he said menacingly. "And I know that you won't choose jail when you come to think it over. I'll give you a day to make up your mind. You be here at this same time to-morrow, or it will be the worse for you."

She pleaded with him to renounce his purpose and leave her in peace, but he laughed at her and went away with a parting threat.

Nina retraced her steps to the house in a state of great agitation. She felt sure that Higby was in desperate earnest and would denounce her to the authorities if she should fail to do his bidding. But she would have died before helping him to rob her benefactors.

What resource then was left? Flight! Once more to become a fugitive--to live under the ban of the law--to fear any moment the touch of an officer's hand upon her shoulder.

The castle of dreams that she had been building in the last few happy days seemed ready to dissolve in mist.

She tried to assume her usual cheerful manner when she entered the house, but the girls noticed at once that she was pale and anxious.

"What's the matter, Nina?" asked Bess. "You're as white as though you'd seen a ghost?"

"I hope you haven't run across any of the gypsies!" exclaimed Cora, in quick apprehension.

"Nothing like that," Nina asserted.

"Nor Higby?" asked Belle.

Nina faltered, and at this the others jumped to their feet in great excitement.

"Do you mean to say that that cur is lurking around here yet?" demanded Cora.

Nina broke down then, and told them all the details of her meeting with Higby.

The girls were aghast at the plan to rob the house.

"He's getting along fast," remarked Belle bitterly. "He's graduating from the sneak thief to the burglar class."

"I wonder what we ought to do," said Bess. "It's too bad the boys are away to-day. I suppose the police ought to be told about it."

"There's nothing yet to tell," said Cora. "He'd simply deny that he ever suggested anything of the kind to Nina. It would be only her word against his, and she has no witnesses. Besides, for revenge, he'd blurt out all about that Roxbury matter."

At this moment the maid announced a visitor, and Nina vanished as Mr. Baxter entered the room and greeted the girls cordially.

"Sort of an Adamless Eden here, I see," he laughed, as he noted the absence of the boys.

"Yes," smiled Cora, "they're out for a spin to-day by themselves. But I expect that they'll be back before long."

"I'm rather sorry they're not here," said Mr. Baxter, "as I wanted to talk over a matter in which you're all interested. I refer to the young lady who has been staying with you for the last week or two."

For a moment the sickening fear came to Cora that Mr. Baxter might be an emissary from the Roxbury authorities.

"Well, what about her?" she asked warily. "She's a dear friend of mine who is paying me a little visit."

"But not a very old friend," said Mr. Baxter quietly, "since two weeks ago she was telling fortunes in a gypsy camp."

A cry broke from the lips of the girls, and they looked at each other in great trepidation.

"Now, now," said their visitor with a genial smile, "she hasn't the slightest thing to fear from me. In fact, I think I'm going to prove one of the best friends she has."

"Oh," breathed Cora in relief, "I hope you will! The poor girl is sadly in need of all the help she can get."

"I have been looking for her for a long time past," said Mr. Baxter. "At least I feel reasonably sure that she's the girl I'm after. And my only object in finding her is to restore her to the home and relative that she ran away from in a fit of youthful anger. I suspected that I had found her in Nina the gypsy girl. But now that I have seen her dressed in civilized clothes and compared her with the pictures in my possession, I feel practically sure of it. Still, I won't know positively until I bring her and my client face to face."

"O," cried Cora, "is your client----"

"There, there!" Mr. Baxter checked her. "No names, please. If I am right in my identification you'll know all about it before long."

"I think I can name him now," smiled Cora.

"Never jump at conclusions," advised Mr. Baxter. "But what I called for especially to-day was to warn you that your house was to be robbed."

"So we heard only a few minutes ago," replied Cora. "Thank you very much for the warning, though."

"So she told you?" remarked Mr. Baxter with a gratified smile. "That's good. I am glad that she has defied that fellow's threats. I was concealed near by and heard the whole conversation."

"What do you think we ought to do?" asked Cora.

"I think," replied Mr. Baxter, "that the girl had better meet Higby to-morrow and pretend to fall in with his plans. I will be on hand and hear all he says. In the conversation that goes on between them, Higby may say something that reveals her innocence and his guilt in that Roxbury affair.

"She can arrange to let him into the house at night, which is evidently the part he wants her to play in the theft. We'll be waiting for him when he comes, and we'll give Mr. Higby the surprise of his life."